Home security and monitoring systems require professional installation and require professional management and monitoring. For small spaces such as apartments, the installation of a monitoring system is not practical due to the investment required to install the system and the on-going expense to monitor and maintain the monitoring system. In addition, in the rental apartment market, landlords do not want the additional expense of a monitoring system and renters do not want to install as system as they cannot take it with them. Existing solutions require multiple components to be installed and provide limited controllability and monitoring capability. Accordingly, an improved monitoring system remains highly desirable.